LIVINGSTON, William, American states man : b. Albany, N. Y., 30 Nov. 1723; d. Eliza bethtown, N. J., 25 July 1790. He was gradu ated from Yale in 1741, was admitted to the bar in 1748, attained distinction in practice, was elected to the provincial legislature from Liv ingston manor, and in 1760 established himself at the well-known country-seat of "Liberty Hall* at Elizabethtown, N. J. In 1774 he became a delegate for New Jersey province to the First Continental Congress, and later served in the second and third congresses. He was a member of the committee of the first congress that pre pared the address to the people of Great Britain. It was with great reluctance that he set himself in opposition to the mother country; but the step having been taken, he supported the Revo lution with all his powers. In June 1776 he took command of the militia of New Jersey, with rank of brigadier-general, and was thereby prevented from signing the Declaration of Inde pendence. On 28 Aug. 1776 he was elected first governor of New Jersey, and this post, having resigned his military command, he held until his death. During the first two years of his administration the State of New Jersey was perhaps more than any other exposed to the operations of the British forces, and this was the cause of many difficulties and dangers. The
legislature was compelled to meet at various dif ferent places, and Tory hostility was strong against the governor, whose capture was several times attempted. In his message of 1777 to the assembly, Livingston recommended the abolition of slavery, and in 1786 caused the passage of an act forbidding the importation of slaves into New Jersey and himself liberated his two slaves. In 1787 he was appointed a delegate to the convention that framed the Constitution of the United States. He was at one time presi dent of the the well-known lawyers' club founded at New York in 1770. He pub lished in 1752 52 numbers of The Independent Reflector, a weekly periodical, in which he opposed the Episcopal Church. His writings include 'Philosophic Solitude> (1747) ; 'A Fu neral Eulogitun on the Rev. Aaron Burr' (1757) ; and 'A Digest of the Laws of New York, 1691-1762' (with W. Smith, Jr., 1752 62). Consult Sedgwick, 'Life and Letters of William Livingston' (1833).